Related Articles

The Foreign Secretary said that the decision to send the Navy's most powerful warship, HMS Dauntless, to the Islands was not provocative, but rather part of "entirely routine military movements.

"They are entirely routine – of course our ships regularly visit the South Atlantic. We don't normally make any comment on the deployment of our nuclear submarines.

"But our Naval vessels regularly visit the South Atlantic."

Mr Hague also commented on the deployment of Prince William, saying the tour of duty to the Falklands "is part of his job".

Flight Lieutenant Wales, as Prince William is known, will be spending six weeks on the islands as a RAF helicopter pilot, in a tour of duty which the Ministry of Defence insists is a routine deployment.

But the visible presence of the prince in the Islands, with the first photographs of him at work released yesterday, comes at a moment of heightened tension between Britain and Argentina.

Angry Argentines have burned British flags in protest at the prince’s arrival, and his deployment to the Falklands triggered outrage from Buenos Aires as tensions grow ahead of the 30th anniversary of the Argentine invasion in April. The country’s foreign ministry expressed regret that an heir to the throne would arrive wearing “the uniform of a conqueror”.

Mr Hague responded to the heightened rhetoric, saying: "We will resist the diplomatic efforts of Argentina to raise the temperature on this and when I was in the Caribbean a couple of weeks ago, the Caribbean nations agreed to support a self-determination of the Falkland islanders which is what we believe in.

"We will put the case for that around the world, including for Latin American and Caribbean nations whenever we get the opportunity."